4 ms·

Things usually recover; look at post-war Europe and Japan, post-soviet Russia, end of Great Recession, etc.

bilbo0s 6y ago
HN User dillonmckay has a point. Recovery happened in all the cases you mentioned because labor had income. Which in turn created demand. Which you satisfied by increasing production. Which, at that time, required more labor. Which gave labor more income. And so on cyclically. If we create even a sizable percentage of automated factories, then you don't necessarily need the same post-WWII levels of labor that you needed back then to get production increases. My own bet would be on inequality in the developed world actually accelerating. Businesses will be doing what's rational. Finding manufacturing locations close to coastal ports for the purposes of distributing their productive capacity across the globe in a bid for redundancy. Automating everything they can. And more. All of which will be completely reasonable actions. It's just that the result will mean even fewer jobs, and even more education to get those jobs. Probably good for the HN crowd if I'm being honest. But not so good for opioid infested flyover country.
- bluGill 6y ago
  That argument goes back at least to the luddites mostly unchanged. Yet here we are with many times the world population, nobody running manual spinning wheels or looms (except hobbiests for fun) and there are more than enough jobs to go around.
  - bilbo0s 6y ago
    Sure. And if you're able to make a satisfactory living for yourself as a barista, grocery store clerk, or delivery driver, go right ahead. My only point is that in flyover country, even before, the available jobs were not giving people a decent living. A lot of them actually get more money by using the whole "disability" scheme. They're actually better off participating in that program, which is a major signal that something was wrong. My bet is that it will be more wrong in the future as measured by the number of people choosing the path of government assistance. It's easy to say there are plenty of jobs from the perch of your average HN User. You have the skills. I have the skills. Good for us. But from the perspective of people trying to get by in rural Wisconsin? Yeah. Not so much.
- Daishiman 6y ago
  > Finding manufacturing locations close to coastal ports for the purposes of distributing their productive capacity across the globe in a bid for redundancy. Automating everything they can. And more. Automation does not necessarily imply offshoring. Germany has highly automated industrial production within the country because it still has a high demand for qualified technicians in its factories, and has a highly integrated supply chain within the country and its neighbors. This is still part of the same trends we have been experiencing for the past couple of decades. If anything it will force strategic thinking from governments of the very real second-order effects, many of which have been ignored.
- Nasrudith 6y ago
  Technically there is one other outcome of increased automation without labor income increases - price drops of goods. It is inferior to a rise in consumer goods in a few ways - less incentive to automate especially if there is little competition. However the lossiness of defection prisoner's dilemma works in the consumer's favor for once. If one automates and takes lower margins then they gain market share but shrink the market cap. If multiple automate and scale up then it leads to even lower margins. This approach does lead to more accessible goods however than an "inflated" higher income for workers norm but also devalues competition from the third world - China produces clothes even for Sub-Saharan Africa and Haiti as it is cheaper than even their labor in areas where there is less money to be made transporting goods and materials.

HN User dillonmckay has a point. Recovery happened in all the cases you mentioned because labor had income. Which in turn created demand. Which you satisfied by increasing production. Which, at that time, required more labor. Which gave labor more income. And so on cyclically. If we create even a sizable percentage of automated factories, then you don't necessarily need the same post-WWII levels of labor that you needed back then to get production increases. My own bet would be on inequality in the developed world actually accelerating. Businesses will be doing what's rational. Finding manufacturing locations close to coastal ports for the purposes of distributing their productive capacity across the globe in a bid for redundancy. Automating everything they can. And more. All of which will be completely reasonable actions. It's just that the result will mean even fewer jobs, and even more education to get those jobs. Probably good for the HN crowd if I'm being honest. But not so good for opioid infested flyover country.

bluGill 6y ago
That argument goes back at least to the luddites mostly unchanged. Yet here we are with many times the world population, nobody running manual spinning wheels or looms (except hobbiests for fun) and there are more than enough jobs to go around.
- bilbo0s 6y ago
  Sure. And if you're able to make a satisfactory living for yourself as a barista, grocery store clerk, or delivery driver, go right ahead. My only point is that in flyover country, even before, the available jobs were not giving people a decent living. A lot of them actually get more money by using the whole "disability" scheme. They're actually better off participating in that program, which is a major signal that something was wrong. My bet is that it will be more wrong in the future as measured by the number of people choosing the path of government assistance. It's easy to say there are plenty of jobs from the perch of your average HN User. You have the skills. I have the skills. Good for us. But from the perspective of people trying to get by in rural Wisconsin? Yeah. Not so much.
Daishiman 6y ago
> Finding manufacturing locations close to coastal ports for the purposes of distributing their productive capacity across the globe in a bid for redundancy. Automating everything they can. And more. Automation does not necessarily imply offshoring. Germany has highly automated industrial production within the country because it still has a high demand for qualified technicians in its factories, and has a highly integrated supply chain within the country and its neighbors. This is still part of the same trends we have been experiencing for the past couple of decades. If anything it will force strategic thinking from governments of the very real second-order effects, many of which have been ignored.
Nasrudith 6y ago
Technically there is one other outcome of increased automation without labor income increases - price drops of goods. It is inferior to a rise in consumer goods in a few ways - less incentive to automate especially if there is little competition. However the lossiness of defection prisoner's dilemma works in the consumer's favor for once. If one automates and takes lower margins then they gain market share but shrink the market cap. If multiple automate and scale up then it leads to even lower margins. This approach does lead to more accessible goods however than an "inflated" higher income for workers norm but also devalues competition from the third world - China produces clothes even for Sub-Saharan Africa and Haiti as it is cheaper than even their labor in areas where there is less money to be made transporting goods and materials.